Crap Hound. Vol. 4

Posted by Matthew Moyer on January 7, 2011

Crap Hound Vol. 4 Edited by Sean Tejaratchi Show and Tell Press

When thinking about starting your own zine, the would-be zinester will often get tripped up on where to find the right imagery. Clip art is just too tacky and generic (plus David Rees has staked that claim) , and who has the money to buy a mountain of old comics and Argosy magazines? Well friend, you’re in luck. Crap Hound has done all the legwork for you! This issue compiles an absolutely jaw-dropping collection of found art, advertising ephemera, forgotten iconography, old library books, and Jack Chick drawings all based around the themes of clowns, devils, and bait. And editor Sean Tejaratchi has crammed full an entire oversized zine with nothing but images drawing from one of those three themes! Even without text each page is overloaded with all manner of vintage eye candy, from Ronald McDonald seemingly drawing a finger across his throat menacingly to a full page diagram of the best insect bait to use to catch fish to an old-timey logo for Red Devil Quick Drying Grout.

The overall effect is almost psychedelic in terms of sheer mental overload; an unending parade of disorienting, eerily innocent images swims in front of your eyes as you turn page after page. But in another way Tejaratchi is rescuing these incredible, quirky images from oblivion and giving them another life, stripped of context or message, to be used in perpetuity for new projects. Crap Hound has been going since 1994. Along the way it has become a favorite of both zine readers and “serious” outlets like the New York Times and the American Institute of Graphic Arts. It’s not hard to see why.